


Rings on Her Fingers

by lotesse



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Gen, Seven Friends of Narnia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-03-14
Updated: 2005-03-14
Packaged: 2017-10-09 03:54:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/82744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lotesse/pseuds/lotesse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Once a King or Queen of Narnia, always a King or Queen of Narnia, and while Polly and Digory have never been king or queen it is true of them as well. It connects them, the old woman and the old man and the solemn teenagers and the laughing children.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rings on Her Fingers

Polly watches the Pevensie children. She is fond of them all: noble, serious Peter, all aflame with the idealism of youth, passionate, intelligent Edmund, trying so hard to rein in a rather prickly nature, imaginative Lucy, bright and enthusiastic and not at all given to the sillier foibles of her elder sister. Watching Lucy laughing in the library reminds her of her own garret corner long ago, the candles and the bottles of ginger beer and the merry day of childhood, when it seemed that life would always be exciting and new and simple. That was before the war, of course, and now everything is quite different. But by some delightful alchemy the bright-haired little girl had managed to hold on to the sunlight of earlier days, and Polly feels sometimes like a patron at a museum, peering with her face pressed up against the glass at Lucy's happiness, Peter's hope, Edmund's stubborn perseverance.

Once a king or Queen of Narnia, always a king or Queen of Narnia, and while Polly and Digory have never been king or queen it is true of them as well. It connects them, the old woman and the old man and the solemn teenagers and the laughing children, even though she doesn't quite know Eustace and little Jill yet. They are very young, and still in school, and she doesn't see as much of them as the older and more independent Pevensie children. All together they are the Seven Friends of Narnia, and as the days darken they find themselves pulling together into a tight huddle, clinging to each other and the memories of what they once had. Together they turn from air raids and rations to feasts and ships and great deeds of valor, from blackout curtains to drapes of gorgeously embroidered velvet.

But Polly sees the desperation and heartbreak in Peter's face, his need to be the white knight and end the injustices of the world. He aches to be doing something, helping in some way, and yet he is king enough to be unsure as to the justice of such total warfare. He does not yearn to kill, but doesn't know what else to do, and she sees in his eyes a feeling of terrible responsibility. The eldest, the High King, he needs to protect them, but the world looks at him and still sees nothing but a boy, still not quite old enough to enlist and begin the slaughter that they call the duty of a man.

Polly sees Edmund's bold spirit quailing under a weight of guilt, and she knows that he still doubts his own worth, still bears the marks of his own terrible treachery. She wants to tell him that this isn't his fault, that this war has nothing to do with his fall to the temptations of the Witch so long ago, but knows well enough that if she mentions it he will fiercely deny ever feel any such thing, and what if she's wrong? Evil is not so different in England and in Narnia, and she fancies that this darkness is not so different from Jadis' winter. But she also knows that if Edmund is culpable, then she and Digory are doubly so, for they unleashed her in the first place, woke her from sleep so long ago. And that can't be right, it can't be. How are they ever to know what their doings may lead to? How can all the wickedness in the world be the fault of little children? Sometimes she wants to run to him, to comfort him, to confide in him. She clings to the memory of the Lion's forgiveness given to a little girl a lifetime ago, and she wants to ask him if he remembers it too. But she's not sure if forgiveness is enough anymore.

Polly sees, as she suspects Digory of not seeing, the changes that have occurred in Lucy since she and Edmund had come back from Narnia the third time. Digory sees the big changes in all of them, but this pain he doesn't remember to look for. His head is too far in the clouds, and sometimes she half-suspects that he really would fall into a well from looking at the stars, like the Greek philosopher he liked to laugh about. But her Digory, the grown-up boy that she's loved for so long, her dreamer, there are some problems so big that he can't help seeing them, and someday, she fears, they will swallow up his stars.

Once Lucy was a child with a heart of laughter and dreams and love and simple trust. Now, after her voyage, Lucy is different. She's become quiet and melancholy, and she comes to the other Friends not as she was once did, running to kindred of the heart, but as if she is running from something, hiding in the comfort of their circle. Edmund had told them that Aslan had exiled them, sent them back to England never to return again, but there was more to this than no longer being able to go back to Narnia. Each of them in turn had been barred from that bright land, and each had grieved for a time and then moved on, content or nearly so to hold their memories close and grow up. Edmund has, though the grief is still new and strong, a delicate wound that could easily break open again if not carefully sutured. No, Lucy's sorrow is different.

Polly is the only other woman-Daughter of Eve, as the Talking Beasts would say-to have remained a friend of Narnia. Susan had reigned as Queen in Cair Paravel as Polly has never done, but she had turned away from stories and dreams, closing the door to Narnia firmly in her mind, and Polly knows that she will not have seen the change in her little sister. But Polly is a woman and a Narnian lady, and she knows the signs of it. She knows that this time Lucy has left her heart in Narnia, and by the three children's talk she judges it to still be in the keeping of the young King they had set upon the throne and then voyaged with. She knows that Lucy has been exiled from more than a dream-land, and each day her sunshiny heart grows more heavily shadowed.

She sees the way that Lucy's brothers close ranks about her, their brief touches more frequent and their manner almost painfully gentle. Edmund, at least, knows her sorrow, and he will have told his brother. The children have very few secrets from one another. But she knows, as they do not, that no attentions of theirs will mend the girl. She's grown up suddenly and painfully, been forced to put away childish joys for womanly anguish and heartache.

And as she watches even Digory, the bravest man she has ever known, withdraws more ad more into his books, burying himself in Plato and Thucydides' accounts of the Peloponnesian Wars that Socrates had fought in. She knows that he's looking for answers, some moral guidance in a suddenly more-tumultuous world. Sometimes Peter is with him, and together they spend many hours in the warm, dark study, questing for the honorable choice as valiantly as did ever and King and a Lord quest.

But as for Polly herself, she just watches them all, watches their bright hearts dim, their hopes dwindle. Every one of them is breaking slowly, slowly, dragged down by the filthy, prosaic agony that each day has become. When they huddle together around the fire and warm themselves with their memories of adventures past she hears the longing and desperation in all their voices. Sometimes she catches a peculiar twist of Edmund's mouth or the brightness of unshed tears glimmering in Lucy's eyes. And she has memories of her own, and at times like these they rise to the surface like dark oil on clear water, both beautiful and treacherous, to slick and fluid to be banished.

Once there were twelve rings, six like the sun and six like the earth, gold and green and beautiful, and they were portals to great wonders. Made by dark, dishonest, foolish magic, but themselves marvels unbelievable. She knows where they buried them long ago, she and Digory. The rings were too dangerous. The rings were not right. The rings were tainted by the dark and foolish magic by which they were made. Aslan had commanded it, and she had never truly disagreed, never really wanted to disobey. Digory had tried to relate it to Plato, but he was just a boy then and his arguments had slipped and slip out from under him. She had agreed with his conclusions just to shut him up. But she had not fought the Lion's commandment, not then. Now, she is not so sure.

They are all dying by pieces, day by day. It sounds terribly silly and dramatic when she says it to herself in the darkness, but she knows that it's true. Slowly they are losing faith, losing strength. Peter flees to old wisdom, trying so hard to choose. Digory hides behind his philosophers, dead and gone and unable to betray or wound. Edmund gains lines and there are dark smudges under his eyes that did not used to be there, and is more likely to fall into brooding silence than to speak. Lucy grows ever more pale and silent, fragile, a wounded woman in a child's ill-fitting skin, chafing against too much sorrow. She herself is certainly lacking in bloom, her sleep uneasy and her waking uncertain. She feels new aches and pains in her once-familiar body and knows that she is at last beginning to feel old. And the world has gone mad with darkness, and she cannot see any end to its horror.

Twelve rings there were once, and are still in a secret place that she still knows. Twelve rings that lead to home. Narnia! She remembers it as a blaze of sensation, color and melody and the feel of life all around her. She cannot conceive of this sort of dull despair existing in that place of glory and passion. If they could only get to Narnia, Edmund could be healed of his guilt. Peter would be able to find the virtuous path. Lucy could learn about the joyous part of growing up, taste of adulthood's pleasures as well as its pains. Digory could practice his philosophy in the way that he used to, in delight and not in fleeing fear. She could…in the end, all she wanted was to see a Narnian sunset one more time, to speak with a dryad and to dance with a merry faun. It had been such an awfully long time.

The rings are still there, buried deep in the ground, their passports home. She cannot, will not believe that Aslan could really be so cruel as to condemn them to this. Perhaps these thoughts are sacrilege; she has never really been able to follow Digory's discourses on that sort of thing. But they suffer so much in part because of what Aslan Himself had done to them. Had they never known Narnia, never become Kings and Queens and Lords and Ladies, it would not hurt quite so much. The Lion had given and the Lion had taken away. He had held life to their lips like a goblet full to the brim of the sweetest wine and allowed them to taste of it for a few moments before he turned it into ashes in their mouths. But he had left them a way home.

She does not speak of her thoughts, not yet. She keeps them to herself, going over them in the darkness before dawn when sleep will not come. She knows that in those hours, day upon day, she has come to a decision. If the tide does not turn, if this slow, living death does not end, she will take their salvation into her own hands. She will not involve the others; all that they need to do is slip the rings on their fingers. It could even be an accident. If what she found herself planning alone in the cold hours was wrong, if it was not Aslan's will, she would make certain that they would remain blameless. The agency would be all hers, and hers to would be the blame. But still she cannot believe that the Lion that she remembers would truly wish this. Did he not love them all? Were they not his beloved ones? Was he not a good Lion? Deep in her memory she hears a voice saying, "Not a tame Lion," but she ignores it. She must. She can't bear to go on like this, and now at least she has hope. There is an escape.

She sees them all, always, and she can't bear it. She will bring them home; she must, or break her own heart. One morning, after a particularly long night of painful wakefulness, of uncertain thoughts and aching bones, she finds herself singing. She recognizes the tune-it's a thin, silly little nonsense verse that he mother used to sing, years ago in a different time and place. "Ride a cock-horse to Banbury Cross to see a fine lady on a white horse; with rings on her fingers and bells on her toes, she shall have music wherever she goes." It echoes strangely in the pale, bright day-lit room, and Lucy, hearing it, turns to look at her with a wan smile. Polly smiles back, trying to reassure the child, and at that moment she swears it in her heart: she will find a way to bring them home.


End file.
